Get XcitEd About EdTech in Helsinki This December

November 22, 2018

December’s largest edtech event used to be New York City’s EdTech Week hosted by StartEd. With New York’s EdTech Week now scheduled for June, there is a new destination for edtech founders, researchers, and investors in December. While it may be dark most of the day and extremely cold, the hottest place to be in December is now Helsinki, Finland where the annual edtech event, XcitED, is scheduled to take place. This year’s event take place on December 4.

XcitED’s 2018 Program

XcitED is hosted by xEdu, which describes itself “Europe’s leading business accelerator for edtech startups.” While based in Finland, since its launch, xEdu has accelerated 47 companies from 8 countries. Among other things, xEdu supports product development, market entry and expansion efforts, and offers assistance to edtech startups in the form of coaching, mentoring, and testing. Each year, xEdu also hosts XcitED, and this December’s lineup promises to offer European and global edtech founders, researchers, and investors a program that they won’t want to miss.

Three key themes will dominate XcitED’s 2018 event: ‘AI and Big Data;’ ‘Learning and the 21st Century;’ and ‘Public Versus Private Education.’ Among other highlights is a panel discussion on machine learning featuring Harri Ketamo, Founder of HeadAI; Martin Siltberg, Director Business Development at Sana Labs; and Maria Ritola, Co-founder of Iris AI, a company that is quickly changing how keyword searches are carried out by combining human knowledge and AI in a powerful new form of search. As part of the conference’s focus on Learning in the 21st Century, another woman leader in edtech, Kati Tiainen, the digital learning and strategy director at Microsoft, will give a keynote on building the school of the future.

Like other large edtech events, XcitEd aims to attract investors alongside founders and researchers. Some voices from the investment sector will also be on the XcitED 2018 program, include representatives from Learn Capital, Brighteye Ventures, Mountain Nazca, Pivot5, and GSV. These investors will hopefully also all be watching when xEdu’s Sixth Accelerator School participants make their final pitches at the close of the conference. While some pitches will be by Finnish companies, there will also be final pitches made by Maltese, Egyptian, and American edtech startups who are currently participating xEdu’s Accelerator.

While XcitED is already a great reason to head to Helsinki this December, for anyone who needs additional incentive, XcitEd is also an official side event of Slush, one of the world’s leading startup events. Slush runs in Helsinki from December 4 to 5. If you haven’t been to Slush in the past, the event, once a small local gathering, has now grown to a network of large-scale events that attract over 40,000 attendees annually around the world. Still, in the Slush network, the Helsinki event continues to dominate, attracting on average 20,000 attendees, 2,600 startups, 1,600 investors, and 600 journalists.

Finland’s Expanding EdTech Scene

Finland may be a relatively small nation but when it comes to edtech, it continues to rise to the top. Finland is not only home to Europe’s largest edtech accelerator but also home to dozens of fast-growing edtech startups. According to xEdu Program Director, Niko Lindholm, there are currently over 80 edtech startups and around 150 established edtech-related companies in Finland. Lindholm also estimates that since 2015, between 10–12 million euros of venture capital money has been invested in Finnish edtech companies.

If you’re already planning to attend Slush, you’ll automatically have entrance to xEdu’s XcitED event in early December. If not, access to XcitEd, its startup demo-area, and an EdTech after-party is only €150. Details about passes are available on the XcitEd website.

One Comment

Author makes some good points but, actually, a whole lot is known about homeschoolers. It is no wonder that parent-led, home-based, not-tax-funded education (homeschooling) is growing amongst a diversity of people – dark- and light-skinned; rich and poor; urban and rural; high- and low-income; Hindu, Jew, agnostic, pagan, or Christian – all around the world. The home educated perform better (on average) academically, socially, and into adulthood than those who attend public/government schools (see research below). In the peer-reviewed Journal of School Choice review of only peer-reviewed research, Ray showed (2017) that 78% of the studies found that homeschooled students and graduates performed significantly better than their conventional or institutional school peers and institutional/conventional school students performed significantly better in only 4% of the studies.) Whether the propaganda in State-run schools is leftist, centrist, or rightist; heterosex-only or LGBTQIAXYZ; socialism, neo-Marxism, or hard-handed capitalism, freedom-loving parents do not want their children indoctrinated by the State. Whether it is about medical freedom (i.e., no coerced/forced injections into children’s bodies) or too many lice, it is freedom. However, the statists, control-lovers, elitists, and the NEA teachers’ union will not rest, and are hard at work across the USA and in other nations to further control home-based education or co-opt it with tax-funded school-at-home programs. See research at http://www.nheri.org